"While most of us have become 'domesticated' and
hearken to the inner voice of conscience that has been strengthened by moral
and spiritual values cultivated over centuries of civilized behavior, those
individuals who have succumbed to the more vicious seed of the wolf within them
walk among us today as those sadistic sex criminals who slash, tear, rip, rape,
mutilate, and cannibalize their victims."_Brad Steiger, Author
lycanthrope(li'ken-thrope,
li-kan'-)
1. In folklore, the
ability to assume the form and characteristics of a wolf or other animal (wolf
most common).
2. A delusion that
one has become or assumed the characteristics of a wolf or other animal (wolf
most common). . . .
In the original folklore/court documents
concerning werewolves, they were thought of much differently than the hapless
victims played by Lon Chaney Jr., and later David Naughton. In the
tradition/opinion of the Catholic Church, the werewolf was a willing agent of
the Devil, who, through a pact and a prescribed diabolical rite, was able to
transform at will, not by curse or full moon, into a near-indestructible beast,
solely for the purpose of creating murder and mayhem amongst mankind. In France
and Germany, the number of people convicted and executed as werewolves was in
the 1000s, the most infamous in all history being Peter Stubbe,
of Bedburg, Germany, who purportedly raped, murdered, and devoured men, women,
and children, unhindered, for 25 years, while changing to and from the form of
a large, black wolf. He was finally captured, convicted, and tortured to death
during a lengthy, ritualistic process not meant in the least to produce a quick
death, but rather, to insure that this monster, through extreme pain and
disfiguration, was unable to return and wreak havoc. At a time before man had any knowledge of
mental illness, all the most heinous criminals, which in our day are referred
to as ‘serial killers’, ‘ violent sexual predators’, ‘cannibals’, and ‘necrophiliacs’,
were dubbed, ‘Vampires’, ‘Werewolves’, and ‘Ghouls’.
The Malleus Maleficarum, or ‘The Witch’s
Hammer’, the procedure manual used by the Catholic church for some five hundred
years prescribing the methods of trying and torturing witches goes into great
detail concerning the phenomena of “Wolves which sometimes Eat Men and Children
out of their cradles”, and “Witches who can, by some glamour, change Men into
Beasts”
“ If the devil moves the inner consciousness, he does so either by
projecting himself into the cognitive faculty, or by changing it. But he does
not do so by projecting himself; for he would either have to assume a body, and
even so could not penetrate into the inner organ of imagination; for two bodies
cannot be at the same time in the same place; or he would assume a phantasmal
body; and this again would be impossible, since no phantasm is quite without
substance.
Similarly also he cannot do it by changing the cognition. For he would
either change it by alteration, which he does not seem able to do, since all
alteration is caused by active qualities, in which the devils are lacking; or
he would change it by transformation or local motion; and this does not seem
feasible for two reasons: First, because a transformation or an organ cannot be
effect without a sense of pain. Secondly, because in this case the devil would
only make things of a known shape to appear; but S. Augustine says that he
creates shapes of this sort, both known and unknown”.
“As to the first argument, that text is often
quoted, but it is badly understood. For as to where it speaks of transformation
into another shape or likeness, it has been made clear how this can be done by
prestidigitatory art. And as to where it says that no creature can be made by
the power of the devil, this is manifestly true if Made is understood to mean
Created. But if the word Made is taken to refer to natural production, it is
certain that devils can make some imperfect creatures. And S. Thomas shows how
this may be done. For he says that all transmutations of bodily matters which
can be effected by the forces of nature, in which the essential thing is the
semen which is found in the elements of this world, on land or in the waters
(as serpents and frogs and such things deposit their semen), can be effected by
the work of devils who have acquired such semen. So also it is when anything is
changed into serpents or frogs, which can be generated by putrefaction”.
“The devils run throughout the
world and collect various germs, and by using them can evolve various species.
And the gloss thereon says: When witches attempt to affect anything by the
invocation of devils, they run about the world and bring the semen of those
things which are in question, and by its means, with the permission of God,
they produce new species”.
“There is incidentally a question
concerning wolves, which sometimes snatch men and children out of their houses
and eat them, and run about with such astuteness that by no skill or strength
can they be hurt or captured. It is to be said that this sometimes has a
natural cause, but is sometimes due to a glamour, when it is effected by
witches. And as to the first, Blessed Albertus in his book On Animals says that
it can arise from five causes. Sometimes on account of great famine, when stags
and other beasts have come near to men, sometimes on account of the fierceness
of their strength, as in the case of dogs in cold regions. But this is nothing
to the point; and we say that such things are caused by an illusion of devils,
when God punishes some nation for sin. See Leviticus xxvi: If ye do not my
commandments, I will send the beasts of the field against you, who shall
consume you and your flocks. And again Deuteronomy xxxii: I will also send the
teeth of beast upon them, etc.
As to the question whether they are true wolves, or devils appearing in
that shape, we say that they are true wolves, but are possessed by devils; and
they are so roused up in two ways. It may happen without the operation of
witches: and so it was in the case of the two-and-forty boys who were devoured
by two bears coming out of the woods, because they mocked the prophet Elisaus,
saying, Go up, thou bald head, etc. Also in the case of the lion which slew the
prophet who would not perform the commandment of God (III. Kings xiii). And it
is told that a Bishop of Vienna ordered the minor Litanies to be solemnly
chanted on certain days before the Feast of the Ascension, because wolves were
entering the city and publicly devouring men”
“During the several weeks that
followed, soldiers and armed peasants killed several wolves, but the Beast was
not among them. The despairing people were becoming more and more convinced
that the creature was supernatural, and therefore unstoppable” _quote taken
from The Beast Of Gevaudan
- other true life ‘werewolves’ of
interest:
Gilles
Garner, the ‘Hermit of Dole’
The ‘Boy
Lycanthrope’
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